


Pieces Missing

by Alasse_Irena



Category: Dance Academy
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 17:26:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/600292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alasse_Irena/pseuds/Alasse_Irena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kat and Tara find that grieving on your own is a lot harder than grieving together. Set after the end of series two.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pieces Missing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pathstotread](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pathstotread/gifts).



> Thanks to TheFifthCircuit and Alice_Majella for beta-ing.

The first full day of holidays is one of those burning summer days you don’t seem to get in Sydney. I wake up to the smell and sound of a fierce north wind, and my lips already feel chapped. For a minute, I feel like a younger me – the Tara that slept in this bed before the Academy, when Saskia was just a glossy poster for me to envy, when Sammy wasn’t even a face I’d seen in audition week.

I’d go back in a second, if I could.

“Tara Tiara, how are you still asleep?” It’s Kat, bubbly and bright. Her hair is still in its two plaits, even though Dad was in fits of laughter at her outfit yesterday. She took it gracefully. Pretty sure she saw it coming. At least she’s given up on the overalls.

“How are _you_ awake?” I counter. She’s usually the Sleeping Beauty of the two of us.

“Twelve days till I have to go home and deal with the parentals. I’m not missing any of this” – she twirls on the spot, gesturing around her – “for a second.”

I shake my head. I love my home and all, but seeing Kat this energetic before ten is unnerving.

 

It’s hard work keeping up with her. For me, going home to the farm is going backwards in time. I don’t have to wonder whether I’m good enough. I don’t have to worry about what I said to Kat, or what Kat said to Christian. I don’t have to think about the future. After a whole year of work, I can stop, and think, and finally breathe.

Not Kat. She’s a whirlwind. She wants to suck every moment out of her stay. She makes me give her the tour before breakfast. “I want to see every corner of your kingdom,” she says melodramatically. I roll over and throw my pillow at her.

“Come on. I want to see everything.”

“Can’t you sleep in, Kat?” I pull my doona over my head, even though it’s too warm already to sleep under anything heavier than a sheet. “In a couple of months we’ll be back at school, and you’ll regret all this getting up early stuff.”

“Please?” she whines. “Show me those mower things you country people ride around on.”

I suspect her obliviousness is an act, but I laugh anyway. “Quad bikes? God, Christian is less clueless than…” I break off, because I’m still not really sure where the two of us stand with Christian. I managed to go two years without noticing what Kat thought of him, and the guilt isn’t going to leave me easily. “All right,” I say, to cover my hesitation. I swing my feet out of bed. “You make me breakfast and I’ll show you anything you want.”

***

It should make me happy that Kat’s happy, but every time she smiles, I wince. I sometimes almost hear myself saying, “Just stop it, Kat.” It takes longer than it should for me to realise that what I want to say is, “Stop it, Kat. It’s not fair.”

It’s not fair that when she smiles, it looks real. In the bathroom, I smile at myself in the mirror, but I’m lying to myself. There are dark smudges under my eyes, and my lower lip is cracked and dry. I make a mental note to stop chewing my lip, because I’ve got nothing to be anxious about anymore.

If we were styles of dance, for once I would be hip-hop or contemporary – something gritty and raw and honest. Kat’s classical ballet, perfect and poised, at least on the surface. Underneath, ballet is pain and blisters and work. As soon as I’ve thought about it, I can’t stop wondering – what’s under Kat’s surface?

***

I offer her my memories of Sammy, almost as a test – the good ones, because they’re the only ones I can bring myself to think about. “Remember when Sammy and you sung karaoke on Abigail’s bed?”

“We didn’t,” says Kat. “We were on your bed.” She doesn’t say anything more, and I have to leave it at that, because there’s suddenly nothing more to say.

 

I offer her my feelings instead.

 “Do you ever feel like a jigsaw puzzle?” I do – a puzzle that only had a few pieces left to put in when someone swept it off the table and back into the box, and I’m not sure whether it’s worth the effort of starting again.

“God, I hate jigsaw puzzles. Natasha used to try and make us do them, when she was being all family-ish.” She fiddles with the end of a plait, not looking at me.

“No, I mean, do you ever feel like you _are_ a jigsaw puzzle? Like, with pieces missing.”

She shakes her head. “Nope, more like silly string.” She doesn’t explain how or why, and I don’t ask.

 

“Tara, don’t.”

I know exactly what she means, but I ask anyway. “What?”

“Stop thinking so much. This year was a total disaster. Can we just move on?”

“And forget about Sammy, you mean?” My mind catches up with the words a second too late, and I feel fierce and stupid and guilty.

“No one’s _forgetting_ about Sammy.” Kat doesn’t look at me, but I feel like she’s glaring at me anyway. “It’s happened. It’s done. I’m not forgetting it. I’m just sick of people going therapist on me.”

There’s a little part of me that wants to shout at her for rejecting my efforts to be a good friend, but I catch myself this time before I make the mistake. She’s my best friend, and not only that, I’ve got her here until Christmas. I don’t want to ruin anything.

“Sorry,” says Kat, just before I do. “Just…” She hesitates. “Just this once, can it just be you and me? I don’t want to think about Sammy, or Christian, or whatever messes we’ve made this year. Let’s just be you and me, and have fun. The Academy’s only going to get harder from here.”

I stare at her. I’m relieved that she’s hurting too, which means I’m a terrible friend after all. “I suppose,” I say. “I can try.”

***

Somehow, in the same house, with nowhere else to go, I get the feeling Kat is avoiding me. When I get up in the morning, she’s gone out with Dad to check fences. When Mum calls out for someone to come grocery shopping, she agrees, then changes her mind at the last minute and leaves Mum and me alone. It’s like I’ve walked in on her naked. Except that if I’d accidentally caught her naked, I would’ve been more embarrassed than her, and we’d probably both be laughing about it by now.

“Kat’s really taken to the farm, hasn’t she?” Mum asks, deliberating between low-fat and full-cream yoghurt. There’s something a little bit unnatural in her voice.

“Yeah, I guess.”

“She’s been out helping your dad every morning.”

I guess at the question she’s trying to ask. _Why is she doing it without you?_

“Yeah,” I say. “Maybe she should rethink her career.”

I mean it as a joke, but it doesn’t feel like one. I can’t catch the words once they’ve come out, so I just count myself lucky I’ve only said them to Mum. If I’d said that about Kat to any of my friends at the Academy, it would have been a betrayal. If you spend time doubting yourself between the whirlwind of classes and rehearsal, that’s time you could’ve spent working on your _fouettes_ , or in the pilates studio, or thinking about that choreography assignment. Suggesting someone should reconsider their options is telling them they’ll fail.

***

I don’t know if it’s the heat, or the tension or what, but no matter how many times I close my eyes, they open again. I’m exhausted from trying to be careful, from talking around things to keep everyone happy. You know how people say there’s an elephant in the room? In my house, there are a whole herd of elephants, and one of them has Christian’s face, and one of them has Sammy’s, and one of them is the space between me and Kat, which seems to be getting bigger all the time. I can’t figure out a face to put on it, but it’s there anyway.

I breathe. I need to go backwards. There was a Tara who thought she was ready for anything, and she would bounce up again no matter how far down she was. I roll over and reach for my phone. I tell myself I’m checking the time, but it’s in bright red digits on my bedside table. Maybe I’m checking for new messages.

I’m not. There’s only one message I want to hear, and it’s been on my phone for weeks.

“Miss Webster.” Even though it’s tinny through my phone’s speakers, his voice makes me smile. “Can you believe that this momentous day has finally arrived?” It sounds real. It sounds like he’s on the other end of it, in his big house in his leafy suburb putting up with his bratty little brother over summer -  although Ari’s a good kid, really. “It’s just me and you. _Prix de Fonteyn_ , baby.” The message doesn’t even make sense any more. The _Prix_ is over, and the girl that message was for is like an old friend who’s drifted away. “Look, I think Christian’s on his way to see you.”

My phone buzzes in my hand with an incoming call. I hit answer, then realise that it’s Christian. I almost hang up. I don’t know what me and Christian are any more, and I don’t want to mess up the tenuous thread that’s holding me and Kat together right now.

But he already knows I’ve picked up now, and what’s he doing phoning in the middle of the night, anyway?

“Hey, Christian,” I say, which comes out as more of a mumble, but at least it’s a friendly-sounding mumble.

“How’s your dad?” he asks.

I almost take the phone away from my ear to stare at it, the way people do on TV. “You rang me at” –I glance at the clock beside my bed – “three twenty-two in the morning, to enquire about my dad’s health. Seriously, Christian.”

“Does he need a bit of help around the farm?”

“Not with Kat here.” I think of Kat in her overalls and flannelette shirt and plaits, riding shotgun in Dad’s ute, wheedling him until he lets her have a go at shearing a sheep, staring pensively at the and talking about the weather. “I reckon farming is her new calling.” Again, that flash of guilt.

But, “Could be,” is all he says.

“How about you?” I ask quickly. “How’s Tassie?”

“The place is great,” he says, then adds after a second, “the company, not so much.”

“What do you mean?”

There’s silence on the other end of the line, long enough that I almost feel like he’s hung up on me.

“Christian?”

“Look, I know this is a bit—” He stops. Starts again. “With you and Kat, and me and—” Another pause. “Can I come down and stay for the rest of summer?”

I’m a little bit taken aback. I want to ask what happened, but if I’ve learnt anything about Christian in the past two years, it’s this: don’t pry, ever. All I know is, it’s got to be bad if he’s willing to put up with me and Kat trying pretend we’re not in love with him until school goes back. “I guess,” I say, and feel bad for how uncertain my voice sounds. “I mean, sure, if you want. I’ve just gotta check with my parents.”

“Thanks, Tara. You’re a lifesaver.”

***

The door of the spare room is shut. Kat’s probably asleep, I tell myself, but I can hear music playing faintly, and I know I’m just trying to put it off. This summer was meant to be me-and-Kat time. Time for putting back together everything that fell apart during the year. I may as well just invite Grace to stay while I’m at it.

I knock, gently. “Kat?”

There’s no answer, so after a second, I push the door open a crack. “Kat?” I start, and then I recognise the music. _You were the one who showed me the sky_. It’s Sammy’s solo from the _Prix de Fonteyn_. I have a flash of Sammy showing us, talking about friendship, and what he dances for. I can see Ben up on stage, and all of us, even Miss Raine. Something hitches in my throat, and it matches Kat’s unsteady breathing.

I feel like I’ve intruded. “Sorry,” I whisper. “I’ll talk in the morning.”

I back away from the door and turn towards my room. I’ll be awake all night now, I can guess, with Sammy’s voice and Christian’s playing in my head – a litany of things I can’t take back.

“Tara!” The whisper is sharp, and I freeze on the spot. “Tara.” Gentler, this time.

I turn around. Kat is in her pyjamas and her hair is loose, curly from wearing plaits for so long. Her eyes are a little bit red. It’s one of those impossible things about Kat, that she always manages to look prettiest when you’re not expecting it – in the middle of the night, or after a difficult class, or with her make up smudged and eyes red from crying. My breath catches for a whole other reason, a tangled mess of sympathy and jealousy and love.

“Sorry.” I’m not sure exactly what I’m apologising for. Trying to talk to her at three in the morning? Catching her in a moment she didn’t want me to see? Caring for Christian as much as I care for her? “Don’t worry. I’ll go to bed.”

“No, Tara.” Kat takes hold of my upper arms. “What were you doing?”

There’s a tug-of-war in my mind for a second, but I make it up quickly. It’s never going to get any less awkward to tell her what I’ve done, so I may as well do it now. “Christian rang,” I say.

“What, just now?” There’s a sort of accusation in her voice, but I don’t know what it is.

“Yeah,” I say, feeling uncomfortable. This conversation is like lucky dip in a box full of unhappy lobsters.

Kat rolls her eyes. “Trust you two to have midnight deep-and-meaningfuls.”

I’m immediately on the defensive. “It wasn’t deep and meaningful. He was just calling.”

“What for?” I can tell what she’s thinking. She’s thinking that me and Christian are getting back together.

“Kat, you broke up with him because he’s still in love with me. Doesn’t that give me the right—” I stop. I don’t want to give her the wrong idea. “Not that we are. Not that we’re anything.”

There’s a dark look in Kat’s eyes. I’ve picked the wrong lobster. “Tara,” she says. “Can we just be you and me? Just for now? Can Christian wait until summer’s over?”

“Not really.” I’ve already invited him to stay. I’m about to explain, but Kat breaks in.

“All right. I get it. Christian’s important.” She turns round and heads back to bed.

The unspoken _more important_ hangs in the air behind her.

***

When I come down to breakfast, Kat’s not wearing make-up, and the shadows under her eyes finally mirror mine.

“Morning, Kat,” I say.

She doesn’t answer.

She eats a piece of dry toast in silence and absolute concentration. I find myself watching her closely, like I’m an examiner and this is the end-of-year ballet exam, but she still says nothing, not even to tell me to stop staring.

With the crust of the toast still in her mouth, she gets up and leaves the room. The door swings shut behind her.

Mum looks at me questioningly, and I look back. I shrug, even though I know exactly what’s just happened.

“Is everything all right, Tara?”

I nod, and pour myself cereal. For three spoonfuls, I manage to pretend that I’m that other Tara, from before the Academy, that this is just a normal morning, that Kat’s not even here. But I can’t keep it up. Finally, I put my spoon down and stand up. “I’d better go after her.”

***

It’s one of those moments when you can tell immediately that something’s wrong. Kat is out the back, just out of sight of the house, underneath the tree that used to be my favourite place to dance before I moved to Sydney.

She looks wilted, like all the confidence and passion that makes Kat has evaporated in the summer heat. And she’s dancing, barefoot on the yellowing grass. There’s a strange feeling in my chest, because it’s the Ugly Duckling solo that we did in audition week, just like I imagined doing it.

But the weirdest thing about it is that she stops, frowning, and looks over her shoulder at her working leg in arabesque. That would be normal if I’d seen Abigail doing it – even if I’d seen myself do it – but Kat’s not a perfectionist.

“Kat.”

She turns to face me, but that’s only part of the dance. She’s not looking at me.

“Kat?”

She’s almost at the end – the shimmering _bourées_ as the swan tests her wings – when she collapses to the grass. “Fine, I’m a failure,” she says.

“What?”

“I’m a failure. I’m a bad friend and a bad girlfriend and a bad dancer. I don’t live up to _anybody’s_ expectations.”

“That’s not true,” I say.

“My mum wishes you were her daughter.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I sit down on the grass beside her. Me and Christian danced in this paddock, last summer. Even here, at home, I can’t go back in time. My friends are part of me, and there are traces of them everywhere.

This should be easy. This should be the part where she falls into my arms crying, and I apologise – what I’m apologising for I don’t know – and hug her and tell her it’ll be all right.

It’s not. It feels tense and awkward, and neither of us is going to be the one to fall apart. The fact that Kat can sit on the ground proclaiming her failure at life and _not_ seem like she’s falling apart is another of those impossible talents she’s got.

She meets my eyes, but only for a second. “I think I want that D-and-M now.”


End file.
